"In vain we regret the past, or speculate on what might have been. Yet it is inevitable that we should regret... In dealing with the Goths — regret cannot be avoided, if not regret for what might have been, at any rate regret for our altogether scanty records of what was... the vanishing of their tradition, literature, history, and most of their tongue." Tolkien also deplored the Roman conquest, which led to "the ruin of Gaul and the submergence of its native language (or languages) arts and traditions... dooming to obscurity and debate the history of perhaps the most remarkable of the Cymric speaking peoples."[2]